Is Phil full of it?

Phil saw his shadow this morning. That means, according to legend, six more weeks of winter. But, Phil is only correct about 40% of the time, so two to three more weeks of winter? I don’t think that’s how it works. Beginning Saturday we’re forecast to experience a spell of above normal [at or above freezing] temperatures. If it stays above freezing and there’s not a lot of snow, I can tolerate six more weeks but I’d like it more if Phil is just plain flat-out wrong.

Nature’s Notebook at the USA Phenology Network has a helpful graphic comparing this year’s trends with NOAA’s forecast for the next six weeks. See for yourself. [click the llink under the graphic to see the source]

source: Nature’s Notebook

Soon I’ll begin to more carefully and frequently track the approach of spring to our North Country. For the next several weeks [months?] that will be more wishful thinking than informative. First we need to melt the snow and ice because snow reflects sunlight while bare ground absorbs heat (as do black road surfaces especially). The Minnesota Department of Agriculture tracks soil temperatures. Many seeds germinate when the soil has reached 60℉. Locally, we’re told to plan on frosts any time up until Memorial Day. So, in the North County, we plan on a long, often volatile, spring with, often, a sudden transition into summer.

Before that change bears will be birthing cubs about this time of year, waterfowl will return in about a month, and many non-migrants will enter into the frolics of their own breeding seasons. Spring is when many a young animal’s fancy turns.

Spring

by Mary Oliver

Somewhere
a black bear
has just risen from sleep
and is staring

down the mountain.
All night
in the brisk and shallow restlessness
of early spring

I think of her,
her four black fists
flicking the gravel,
her tongue

like a red fire
touching the grass,
the cold water.
There is only one question:

how to love this world.
I think of her
rising
like a black and leafy ledge

to sharpen her claws against
the silence
of the trees.
Whatever else

my life is
with its poems
and its music
and its glass cities,

it is also this dazzling darkness
coming
down the mountain,
breathing and tasting;

all day I think of her -—
her white teeth,
her wordlessness,
her perfect love.

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